


What they don't know won't hurt them.

by Not_so_emo_emo



Category: Voltron: Legendary Defender
Genre: Altean Lance (Voltron), Altean Prince Lance (Voltron), Bisexual Lance (Voltron), Gay Keith (Voltron), Lance has a twin, M/M, Post-Season/Series 06, kind of, kind of aged up lance, klance, light Latte
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2020-12-21
Updated: 2021-03-02
Packaged: 2021-03-11 01:22:30
Rating: Not Rated
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 3
Words: 3,565
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/28226841
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Not_so_emo_emo/pseuds/Not_so_emo_emo
Summary: He nearly cried out at the impact. The Black Paladin dug his hands into the fabric of his shirt, pushing him harshly against the wall, "Where is Lance?!" Keith snarled. It really was remarkable how his eyes changed to resemble those of pure Galra. It would have scared him if his introduction to the guy hadn't been a gushing retelling of a 'bonding moment' between him and his brother.Alec merely rolled his eyes. "Haven't you been listening. I. Don't. Know.  And to think Lance said you were smart."  Keith was pratically growling as he pulled his arms off of his shirt. "I'll say this once. You will either help me find my brother and fix the mess you made or you will let me leave with that ship and stay the fuck away from him."In which Lance goes off on a solo mission without the others knowing only to be left behind when the team disappears and having to deal with the aftermath.(They do get reunited. In fact most of the time Lance spends a part from them in shown inLance's flashbacks leading up to their reuinion.)
Relationships: Keith/Lance (Voltron), Lance & Shay (Voltron), Matt Holt & Lance
Comments: 6
Kudos: 42





	1. Chapter 1

Alec sighed. He couldn't hear Red like Lance could and as a result this whole 'space roadtrip' was getting real boring real quickly. He could he hear his brother's fellow paladins chattering on the comms but they weren't entertaining enough for him. All they usually did was scold or ignore him anyway and they didn't even know who he actually was or his past. They just thought he was Lance and although that was the goal it was getting difficult to take all the mental beatings now that he knew how they treated his brother. At this point, if they were ever attacked and he was forced into a situation where he would actively have to protect them he was sure he would hesitate. He was only helping them for Lance's sake. 

Really the only good thing about this trip was the amount of freedom it allowed him. Some might say being cooped up in a gaint AI lion with nowhere to go would be boring and restricting but it was nothing compared to being Hagar's personal play thing. That was probably the only thing he owed to the paladins. If the old Black Paladin hadn't caught her attention he would probably still be there. 

He groaned at the unusually gloomy thought and rolled off the makeshift bed, dropping to the floor with a crash that would have surely caused the Red lion to roll their eyes. Pulling himself up, he made his way into his bathroom. He had forgotten how similar he and Lance looked.

They were almost identical. They had the same naturally smooth, soft caramel skin, the same soft hair- of almost replicated shades- and even a similar scar on their foreheads, although that didn't matter to his disguise as none of the others even knew about Lance's scar. The growing list of differences had definatly given them a lot of work. There was Lance's splash of freckles or how much paler his own skin had become for example. Lance's ocean blue eyes were just a ghost of how Alec's used to be, the amount of pure quintesence he'd absorbed had tainted his to a vibrant purple. Lance had also opted to cut his own hair short and preffered to straighten it while Alec had grown his own out to just below his shoulders. 

They would have been easy to compensate for as humans- they would have only needed contact lenses and a hair cut- but neither of them needed that anymore. It had taken them weeks to perfect but they'd finally managed to figure out how to utilize their Altean shapeshifting methods. From there it was childsplay. Mimiking eachother had been something they hadn't done for years but they could still do it to perfection, although Lance was still undoubtably the better actor of the pair.

Alec sighed irritably. He couldn't wait to give those entitled Paladins a piece of his mind when Lance got back, whether he liked it or not, and then go on his merryway back to doing whatever he wanted even at the expense of others. His bored gaze wandered down to necklace at the base of the faucet, softening his gaze to a fond vacant look. 

-

-

-

Lance was pacing around the Hangar's floor, deep in thought. Shiro had been acting strangely ever since he got back. Even the way he came back to them was questionable.

No galra chasing him and somehow he managed to grow at least a few inches of hair in a few months.

Sure that's not normally something that could happen to humans but Lance had tried to chalk it up to some weird thing they were feeding him. He had tried to bring it up to people but Pidge and Hunk just brushed him off and Coran and Allura always seemed too busy, not to mention Keith.

As the new Black Paladin he'd been constantly stressed, his brother returning was just about the best thing he had going for him and Lance didn't want to take that away from him so he let it slide.

Ever since then more and more 'coincidences' just kept piling up. Shiro had become harsher on Keith, which definitely wasn't something he needed right then. His temper was worse and he seemed to be more irritable. He was more closed off when they formed voltron and he didn't seem to remember their time in the astral plane.

The tipping point was how often he sided with Lotor. Sure, he wasn't really there for most of the shit they went through because of Lotor but he always took the teams opinions into account (Lance's less so but still) and now he was just... unpredictable. Volatile. 

A month or so after he met Alec, they'd begun looking into Shiro's captivity. They hadn't been able to get anything from normal bases or even higher ranking ships. They'd come to the conclusion that they needed to either get access to a ship or officer of the inner circle of Hagar's corner of the empire or to get the information from its source- the lab Shiro woke up in.

Using the fuel records of the ship Shiro 'borrowed' and Matt's knowledge of rebel outposts, they managed to find the base without directly involving any of the other team members. 

Their plan was all worked out.

Alec would shift his appearance to match Lance's so the rest of the team wouldn't notice his absence and Alec wouldn't be let loose in a Galra base with the opportunity to sell them out. That in it self was a leapt of faith for them. 

Before he left, Lance would transfer some of his quintessence to Alec to make him compatible with Red for awhile. He wouldn't be truly compatible like the Paladins but he would act as a battery for the lion, allowing her to defend the team as a part of voltron on her own. The quintessence exchange would also allow him to use the red bayard so to make it more believable, Alec would keep the Bayard and Lance would take an Altean knife and blaster.

Finally to ensure that they'd be able to find eachother, they had exchanged tracking and communication devices disguised as necklaces.

That was Alec's side of the plan anyway. Lance's was just to break into a low security research base, get the information and get out as quickly as possible. It was simple and easy. He'd managed way harder missions on his own before so why was this worrying him so much.

A hand on his shoulder caused him to jump and bite down on his lip. Lance squealed and clutched his now bleeding mouth. Alec snorted and ruffled his shorter twins hair.

"Aleeeecc.. That was mean. Don't do that." Alec just rolled his eyes and pulled his brother over to the ship they'd bought off a rebel and equiped with cloaking in preparation for this mission.

Alec got to work straightening out Lance's suit and dusting off forgotten corners. It was just a plain Altean suit made specifically for stealth missions but apparently hadn't recieved much use even before Altea had fallen. 

"Are you nervous?" Lance didn't answer and fiddled with his cut lip, wincing ever so slightly. "It'll turn out fine and hey maybe you'll have a good reason to see your Keefy again." Alec punctuated the sentence with a light nudge to the ribs but Lance didn't push back.

"I shouldn't be wanting to find something wrong with Shiro just to see Keith. That's unfair."

Alec carded his fingers through his hair in what he hoped was a reassuring manner, "Either way, it would be good for you to see Keith again, even if it was just a video call or whatever. It's obvious you miss him and I'm sure he wouldn't mind talking to you again either."

Lance took a slow breath and nodded. "Okay. Yeah. I can do this." He turned to climb into the ship before hesitating and falling back into a hug. Alec smiled and softly reciprocated.

"Get back soon."


	2. Chapter 2

Getting in and out of the lab had turned out to be surprisingly easy, the only trouble he ran into was a couple of sentries on the way out. Thanks to that he only got a few scratches at worse but that wasn't what was on his mind at the moment. 

He was right and he absolutely hated it. 

'Shiro' wasn't Shiro. He was a clone that Haggar had been controlling since his reappearance nearly a year ago. Lance had sent the data to Alec before trying to get in touch with Matt and Keith. He knew he couldn't just go to the others himself, Matt and Keith were at least more likely to be listened to and would definitely take this seriously. It didn't matter to him if they got all the credit- it would hurt but it would be better for the others.

He hadn't been able to get in touch with Keith but Matt was going to meet him back at the castle in a couple of vargas. Alec hadn't gotten back in touch with him since he sent the data but the signal was still transmitting just fine. Well, to an extent. 

It had been sending coordinates up until about an hour ago. It was possible that it was just a glitch but Lance couldn't get the knot of worry out of his chest. All he could do was wait for Matt to get there so he could check up on it.

Speaking of meeting Matt, he'd reached the coordinates the tracker had given him. He hummed nervously and strummed on the control panel, flicking through communication channels desperately searching for any messages or trace of the others. He took notice of how strongly he was shaking and spent a good few anxious minutes trying to hold his leg still before jumping so hard that his legs smacked into the underside of the controls and he bit into his lip, drawing blood. He swore quietly as he reopened the comms channel and sighed in relief. 

It was Matt. Matt would help. And now that Matt was here they might be able get in touch with Keith as well. Keith always made things better.

"Lance? Hey, I got your message. You better have been serious. I don't care who you are, giving a false accusation about Shiro like that is unforgivable." 

Lance shook his head vigorously, "No-No! Matt! I'm serious! That was all real. I-" Matt nodded calmly, smoothening his expression into a gentler one.

"It's okay. Calm down, I was just making sure." Matt flashed him a smile before switching to a more serious expression. "Who else have you told, we have to proceed carefully."

Lance nodded, "Mhm, I tried to tell Keith but he was busy or something so... only you."

Matt sighed and hummed against his finger, seemingly flicking through his scanners like Lance had been a minute ago while Lance sat in his own craft, nervously fiddling with his gloved fingers. 

"D'you know where the Castle is now? We need to sort this out as quickly as possible." This serious Matt was refreshingly reliable, he was glad he wasn't always as Pidge made him out to be.

"Um.. I did. The tracker I was using isn't sending a signal anymore so.. I don't know. Sorry.."

Matt's flicked to meet his warmly, "It's not your fault.. probably." Lance winced a little while Matt muttered on half to himself, "We can't get in touch with them- it would've been especially harder with the lack of good equipment... Do the other's know you're gone?"

Lance shook his head curtly, to which Matt raised an eyebrow and sighed, "I'd say our best bet is the Blade of Marmora. Think you can get us in?" 

Lance nodded, already tapping the coordinates into his console and sending them to Matt. He felt sick. He couldn't believe he had messed this up so much. They'd spent months planning this and he'd messed it up. What was worse was that he couldn't even fix this on his own. Of course he would be the one to mess up a simple mission meant to help the team and possibly even put their lives on the line instead, all because he wanted to prove he was worth a place on the team. Even if they did find the others, they'd still be down a Paladin and Keith, at least, would be a complete wreak again. He didn't think he could take all that again. He didn't deserve to be there anymore, although he doubted he ever did.

\--

It had only taken them a couple of hours to get there, which to them felt like the luckiest thing to have happened to them throughout this whole ordeal. It had taken about 10 minutes or so of back and forth between Lance and the Blades to confirm that yes, he was a Paladin and not a spy and no, Matt was not a spy either and was fine to join them. Eventually, they got annoyed and just asked for Kolivan or Slav.

Once they had landed, they were immediately escorted by a few Blades to meet with Kolivan and explain the situation. On their way, Lance kept trying to discreetly look for Keith, fully aware that he was just holding onto hope that he had just missed all his messages- or even been purposefully ignoring them- and wasn't actually busy on some life threatening mission where he thought him and his life didn't matter and were easily disposable. Yep, Lance was doing great, not worried at all. You're imagining things.

It was only during their talk with Kolivan that his fears were solidified. 

The Blade couldn't contact the castle either and Keith was missing.

According to Kolivan, he went on a mission about a month ago to assist an undercover agent and hadn't checked in since. Now neither of the Blades were answering.

Lance had to hand it to Kolivan, he did seem genuinely worried about both his missing Blade members and the Castle. They didn't seem so disposable to him anyway. He had also offered to let them both stay at the base while they worked to find their missing friends. Matt had declined deciding to check in with the Rebels for ay info. Lance had accepted though, still wanting to hold onto the hope that Keith would be fine and come back soon.

He was led to a room towards the bottom of the base. It was mostly empty and had a stunning view from the window but what stood out most to him was the red jacket tossed messily on one of the beds. This was Keith's room.

Apparently, he'd made some sort of deal with Kolivan to have him own room- not wanting to share with a stranger- and this was the result. 

Lance was too emotionally exhausted to figure out exactly how he felt about this arrangement. He wasn't sure why he would want to stay in his potentially dead friends room, especially one that would rather spend the night in an airlock than in a room with him. Despite his head warning him about the possibly life threatening situation he was in, the Cuban dropped onto what he assumed was Keith's bed and picked up the jacket. 

It really was such an impractical jacket. It almost didn't match Keith with the way he always seemed to prioritise his goal or task above anything that a normal person would enjoy. Then again, Keith wasn't really much of a normal person. He definitely had a way of spontaneously making all his decisions, Lance wouldn't put it past him for the jacket to be the same. Although he would admit it looked good on him- maybe Keith cared about his appearance more than Lance gave him credit for.

He folded the jacket and quickly placed it on a nearby chair as soon as he felt tears building up in his eyes. He wiped them furiously, muffling quiet whimpers.

Keith wasn't dead.

Neither was Shiro.

Or Hunk, or Pidge, or Coran or Allura.

He choked on his mumbling and gave up trying to stop the tears.

Everything was and is going to be fine.

The funeral said otherwise.


	3. Chapter 3

It had only been a few months. A few months of neglecting to eat and sleep in favour of searching every star system they could think of, questioning every person they came across and snapping awake every time they heard a notification. 

They hadn't found anything. Lance's transmitter hadn't picked up anything the whole time, he hadn't sensed Red either and that hurt just as much, it was too reminiscent of the time Blue discarded him. 

Keith had also been declared Killed in Action and although Lance couldn't even fathom him being dead, he also had almost no reason to say otherwise. Keith was gone and he just had to start accepting it.

The Empire hadn't heard from Lotor either since the castle ship had disappeared. They interpreted it as Voltron betraying them and turning against Lotor, possibly even killing him. Lance really wouldn't have minded the prospect of Voltron annihilating Lotor, he couldn't shake the feeling that he had ulterior motives, but now he had to deal with the fallout on his own.

What was left of the Galra Empire was split between following Haggar and Sendak with a smaller proportion of them becoming mercenaries or pirates. Now that they'd split up, they were just causing them more trouble. The Blade didn't have enough members for this and the Rebels usually refused to work with them for the most part. To try to encourage them to work together, Lance had joined the Blade and regularly went on missions with them while trying to balance keeping the coalition together and searching for the others. 

In fact if it weren't for the Blade's rigorous training schedule, Lance doubted he would have gotten any sleep in at all. It was like they took Keith's obsession with training, multiplied it Shiro's stress and sprinkled in some of Allura's ambition. It was enough to knock him out as soon as his head hit the pillow.

After getting back from a relatively light training session, he was lying collapsed on his bed in what used to be Keith's room. He had a mission in about an hour and desperately needed some rest but the coalition needed his attention more. 

Planets had been withdrawing at an increasing rate since the other Paladins' and Coran's funeral had been held. They just didn't have any hope in the war without Voltron. What's worse was he knew he would have a better shot at getting them to stay if he could just talk to them in person but he just didn't have the time. He hadn't even been able to properly mourn yet but that didn't matter anymore. His life had barely any meaning left, he only lived to fulfil his purpose as a Paladin - even if he might not even be classed as one now that the lions were gone.

His eyes snapped back open and he sprung up onto his elbows. His Holoscreen had lit back up with a notification.

"Happy birthday, Lance." -Matt.

He smiled sadly, sending a quick reply before stretching and cleaning himself up briskly. He glanced at the time - he only had about ten minutes until he had to meet the Blades in his next mission. Sighing, he pulled on his suit and left the room.

He was having an amazing birthday so far. Such a great, relaxing day.

He kept his mask and hood up on his way, far too aware of how differently he was built compared to the rest of the blades. It wasn't that he was scared of them, his 'unique' appearance just often drew their attention a little too much for his liking. He enjoyed attention but he had his limits and spending the past year or so with only half a dozen other people who usually didn't even talk to him most days made the sudden change at least a little overwhelming to say the least. 

Not to mention the constant reminder of how truly alone he was now. 

There were a few hybrids in the Blade that usually weren't the same height as other Galra, Keith was always the first to come to mind for him. This usually let him pass as half Galra if he kept his face hidden but the tight Blade suit did little to hide the rest of his body, causing him to keep his shoulders slightly hunched and subconsciously curl his arms around himself. 

Even with his identity hidden, he still drew their stares. The Blade members watched him as he walked past, their eyes lingering far too long to be comfortable. He quickened his pace and strode into the hangar, running through a mental headcount of his team members before coming to a halt beside a lilac coloured Galra with folded, almost puppy-like, ears. He vaguely remembered that they had worked with Keith a lot in the past. The thought left a lump in his throat and tears began forming in his eyes, he was beginning to understand why so many Blades wore masks all the time - even if was probably for a different reason.


End file.
